Chavez
Masculine · “of Chaves”
Chavez is overwhelmingly a boys’ name — 873 boys against 8 girls since 1880.
Chaves is a town in northern Portugal and the Romans built it as a spa. Its name was Aquae Flaviae, the Flavian waters, after the emperor who founded it. Fifteen centuries of Portuguese wore that down to Chaves, which happens to be the ordinary word for keys — and is not.
How old is the name Chavez?
Chavez first appears in US birth records in 1953 — 72 years ago. The typical Chavez alive today was born around 1995, making them about 30 years old. About 800 people named Chavez are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Chavez most popular?
Chavez peaked in 1992, reaching #1505 nationally. Today it ranks #12008, 10,503 places below that high. See the whole 1992 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Aquae Flaviae to Chavez
The story of Chavez
Rome named its spa towns Aquae plus something, and a surprising number of them are still major places. Aquae Sulis is Bath. Aquae Granni is Aachen, where Charlemagne kept his court because of the hot springs. Aquae Sextiae is Aix-en-Provence, and the aix in the name is the same word again. Aquae Flaviae is Chaves, founded under Vespasian, with a Roman bridge still carrying traffic. The surname went from the town into Portugal and Spain and then across the Atlantic, where it is now one of the commonest in the Spanish-speaking Americas, and it has been given as a first name in the United States since the middle of the last century.
Meaningscholars disagree
of Chaves, the Flavian waters
The surname is toponymic, from the Portuguese town of Chaves in Tras-os-Montes, whose Roman name was Aquae Flaviae. The resemblance to chaves, the Portuguese for keys, is a coincidence, and the town's coat of arms uses keys anyway, which shows how old the misunderstanding is.
How the name formed
- Aquae Flaviae
- Chaves
- Chavez
Related forms: Chaves
Pronouncing Chavez
CHAH-vez
Two syllables, stress on the first, in American use. Spanish stresses the first as well and writes an accent to say so: Chavez. The z is an s sound in Latin American Spanish.
Nicknames for Chavez
Moderate
What the data says
146 years of official birth records
The long climb, and where it stands now
The same years in position rather than babies
- First recorded
- 1953
- Most boys named
- 199153 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #1505reached in 1992
- Change vs 2024
- 0.0%5 in 2025, from 5
Rank is a position, a count is a headcount, and they move independently — a name can hold its rank while the number of babies behind it falls. Source: U.S. Social Security Administration.
Chavez in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Chaves in Portuguese — same name
Chavezs among us
people named Chavez are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 boy in 341,615 born in 2025 was named Chavez
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Is it right for you
What happens to a name after it peaks
The Correy test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Chavez's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Correy climbed just as high around 1975, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Correy's path sketches the road Chavez is walking now.
Chavez sits in the calm middle of the cycle — neither chasing a wave nor sliding off one. Middle-of-the-cycle names age slowly and predictably.
A scored estimate from 146 years of naming cycles — not a prophecy. Great names outlive statistics. How this is scored
Chavez beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Chavez in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US boys given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- A documented origin traceable to a named Roman foundation that still exists.
- Two syllables that most people read correctly on sight.
- It serves either child, and the records show both.
- It is a very common Hispanic surname and reads as one.
- The first syllable alone is a class insult in British English.
- The very few girls given this spelling will be read as boys on every form.
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Chavez
Masculine · #12008 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Chavezs are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 800 people named Chavez are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Chavez in 2025?
- Chavez ranks #12008 among US boy names in 2025, with 5 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Chavez?
- About 1 in every 341,615 US boys born in 2025 was named Chavez — 5 in all.
- Will my child share the name Chavez with classmates?
- Chavez will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Chavez
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Garfield#12008 · Chas#12008 · Lew#12008 · Barney#12008 · Dewitt#12008 · Granville#12008 · Cicero#12008 · Willam#12008
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Chavez? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Chavez and another name?
See them side by side — full stats, history and a gentle verdict.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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